>> ^EvilDeathBee:

Most of this video, to me, sounded like minor griping ("I have to move the mouse to the bottom of the screen!" or "I have to do an additional click!"). Raised a few actual issues with it, but overall, I don't mind it. When I first tried Consumer Preview, it was a mess. But since then, they've done a number of improvements. I commend MS for trying something new, it's not perfect but has potential.
I'll be buying it now, and benchmarks seem to show improvements in speed over Win 7. I just hope MS improve the usability with Service Packs and updates (rather than solely security and bug fixes). It is new, it isn't perfect, it will need updates.

They are critiquing an interface. Number of mouse clicks and mouse travel are pretty good ways of determining userbility. Its not really a minor gripe when you do it 100s of times a day, or an unnecessary layer simply confuses. Yes they are looking for problems with Windows8, yes thats their job. They also pointed out a few positive things, hell they even went as far to say that fullscreen start menu is a more intelligent use of screen estate. I'd certainly say its very aesthetically pleasing, but it does seem to have come at a cost. Oh, and apparently its good for touch screens which most PC users won't give 2 shits about.


I also find it commendable that MS should try new things, but it was criticism of Vista that resulted in Windows7. From what I've seen of Windows8...well it seems to me they have their priorities wrong. I'm sure it'll improve over time...then they'll call it Windows9 and ship it

Ctrl+L is not esoteric and plenty of people use keyboard shortcuts. I don't care whether it's part of a Windows library or not but if it's widely used across existing Windows installations you'd expect to be able to use them again in the new version of Windows. But if the new interface is going to disconnect from the desktop experience I just don't understand why it has to be linked at all to the desktop. Schizophrenic indeed. The user-interface needs to be consistent and harmonious. Hasn't everyone got that memo by now?

What they're showing with the search failures is that demonstrates a lack of focus on making the desktop interface as polished and user-friendly as possible. If nothing else it appears rushed and sloppy.

I want the system to be gleaming right out of the box - I don't want to have to note all the little exceptions and workarounds . Clearly in some aspects they've put in some work with multi-monitor support and Explorer but in other areas it looks incomplete.

>> ^spoco2:

Yeah, I'm not sold on the whole interface at all. BUT these guys are also missing things which I got pretty much straight away.
The typing to search for things, and not finding 'device manager' et al... if they just looked then below the search box it shows that it's matched items within Apps/Settings/Files So the default is to show just the apps that match, but if he clicked on 'Settings' then it would have shown him what he was looking for without having to actually go to control panel first. And my guess is there's an option for the search results to list all three of those things. DO THEY NOT LOOK AT THE SCREEN... Arg... now they're doing it for printers. The screen says 'NO APPS MATCH YOUR SEARCH', and then it has 17 matches in settings, and some matches in files.

Then they start bitching about Control L, which isn't a windows thing at all
The tabs thing is definitely something to bitch about, as it makes zero logical sense to have everything hidden off screen and not be able to access things without right clicking.

Yes, it looks like Microsoft have not considered non touch interfaces enough, which is a huge oversight. And it really seems they've taken something that was working really well, Windows 7, and stuffed touch stuff over the top and then said it was all done without looking at whether it was a cohesive whole.

So I don't like the look of windows 8 for non touch devices, but these guys jump to conclusions, don't read the interface properly and assume that everyone is a power user who uses the esoteric key combos they use (even when they're specific to particular apps).

Yeah, I'm not sold on the whole interface at all. BUT these guys are also missing things which I got pretty much straight away.

* The typing to search for things, and not finding 'device manager' et al... if they just looked then below the search box it shows that it's matched items within Apps/Settings/Files So the default is to show just the apps that match, but if he clicked on 'Settings' then it would have shown him what he was looking for without having to actually go to control panel first. And my guess is there's an option for the search results to list all three of those things. DO THEY NOT LOOK AT THE SCREEN... Arg... now they're doing it for printers. The screen says 'NO APPS MATCH YOUR SEARCH', and then it has 17 matches in settings, and some matches in files.


* Then they start bitching about Control L, which isn't a windows thing at all

* The tabs thing is definitely something to bitch about, as it makes zero logical sense to have everything hidden off screen and not be able to access things without right clicking.


Yes, it looks like Microsoft have not considered non touch interfaces enough, which is a huge oversight. And it really seems they've taken something that was working really well, Windows 7, and stuffed touch stuff over the top and then said it was all done without looking at whether it was a cohesive whole.


So I don't like the look of windows 8 for non touch devices, but these guys jump to conclusions, don't read the interface properly and assume that everyone is a power user who uses the esoteric key combos they use (even when they're specific to particular apps).

They could have done a lot better. Not much input or variation. Seems more like an early ameture project just getting the input from the board (you can tie that to whatever interface you want). I'd rather they made it more nuanced, so you could control pitch and yaw, which is totally doable with that hardware.

..Coot looks like he wanted to get some extra mileage outta those modifications....

He's got the oscilloscope modified for hypothetical negative energy conversion..

That display in the center is so positioned to interface with the the invariance of the speed of light created by compensation for inference, and I'm only guessing here, that those buttons on the steering wheel/alignment cradle are some sort of Michelson-Morley interferometer.

Got a great deal onnit but he won't be able to keep a wormhole stable in an open perimeter....good try though, looks like someone helped their kid win a pre-school science fair!!

Oh shit, I forgot about the cyberpuck, which sounds like a robotic Shakespeare character. <- boom goes the dynamite.
And the whole 1280 x 800 smacks of bs to me in the same way Forte's claims of 512x460 did: adding together the per-eye resolution. Granted, they seem to be upfront about the vertical resolution of 800 (which isn't great for 2012 either) but that horizontal res? Boolshit! It might be 1280 for an iguana with eyes on either side of it's head, looking at different shit per eyeball all its life. But for we humans, each eyeball pretty much looks at the same thing, not accounting for parallax of course. So I'd say the actual horizontal resolution might approach 800, depending on how much they want each eye to "share" as it were. So it's essentially a giant square.

Naysaying/partypooping aside, it still looks promising. There's nothing quite like moving your head around to observe a virtual world: it affords the kind of immersion you can't touch with a standard monitor setup, I don't care how big it is. <- that's what she never says. Boom again!

>> ^probie:

>> ^shuac:
Back in '96, I bought a Forte VFX-1 which was a VR headset with stereoscopic vision, very comfy over-the-ear headphones, and motion tracking. All for about $1000.
Each eyeball had it's own little LCD screen (263x230) and I can tell you that it looked like pure ass. Despite it's shortcomings, I played the original System Shock with it and I still have very fond memories of skulking through Citadel station with that thing strapped to my melon.
While I'm not interested in contributing to a kickstarter campaign (after all, that's why we have venture capitalists), I may be interested in a finished retail product.

Ha! I, too, bought a VFX-1 headset. (Had to buy a separate Number Nine S3 Virge card as well so the interface cable would work). I never did play SS1 on it, but I did roll through Quake 1 and all of it's mission packs, as well as used it for Looking Glass' Flight Unlimited. I never used the Cyberpuck controller, as it wasn't very intuitive to me. Once GLQuake came out (which had to run at nothing less than 512x384) that was the final nail in the coffin. But fun times while it lasted.

>> ^shuac:

Back in '96, I bought a Forte VFX-1 which was a VR headset with stereoscopic vision, very comfy over-the-ear headphones, and motion tracking. All for about $1000.
Each eyeball had it's own little LCD screen (263x230) and I can tell you that it looked like pure ass. Despite it's shortcomings, I played the original System Shock with it and I still have very fond memories of skulking through Citadel station with that thing strapped to my melon.
While I'm not interested in contributing to a kickstarter campaign (after all, that's why we have venture capitalists), I may be interested in a finished retail product.


Ha! I, too, bought a VFX-1 headset. (Had to buy a separate Number Nine S3 Virge card as well so the interface cable would work). I never did play SS1 on it, but I did roll through Quake 1 and all of it's mission packs, as well as used it for Looking Glass' Flight Unlimited. I never used the Cyberpuck controller, as it wasn't very intuitive to me. Once GLQuake came out (which had to run at nothing less than 512x384) that was the final nail in the coffin. But fun times while it lasted.

Seems to be you can't really add senses without infringing upon our already existing ones. In his case he uses some of his hearing "bandwidth" to perceive colour. Maybe one day we'll be able to wire in completely new senses, but I don't imagine that will be soon.

Tbh, I consider us all to be psuedo-cyborgs because of our phone apps not in spite of them. We are all almost always connected with a wealth of utilities at our finger tips, some of which you could say broaden our senses. Do we need to implant microchips in our brain when carrying a device that fits in your hand is just that much more convenient - and you can opt out at any time. I think we are heading to headsupdisplays and truly hands-free interfacing. Does that make it more of a part of us than it is already? I'm not so sure tbh. Whats the advantage of putting it under your skin when it'll still be piggybacking off existing senses?

Anyway, transhumanism is fascinating. I hope we survive long enough.

Naw, A large percentage of users interact and comment before they get the feel of the site and understand the process. Since we already eliminate new users from seeing most of the interface when viewing videos this would just go one step further towards alienating new users.

I know when I started here, I commented for quite a while before I started my first post.

I think commenting and interacting is the real life experience that brings us all here, to eliminate that would be detrimental to the site.

Spammers suck, but they are a reality on the internet today. we already have a few user based tools to eliminate spammers as soon as they show up and that seems to be working.

Seeing if a new poster has been commenting is also a way for us to examine and weed out spam users. If a new user posts a video that may be spam, checking their comments is one of the best way to see if they are an active member or a spammer just passing through.

If we don't allow them to comment first, they they will all look like spammers...

I will be dead, but it scares me to think what jobs the un-educated will be able to do in 50 years.


I don't think it'll take that long before this becomes a much bigger issue.

Right now there's a few important barriers that are holding back a huge flood of automation: driving on public roads, recognizing and handling awkward materials, interfacing in delicate, safe ways with people (and recognizing their subtle cues for motion, etc..). We could see computers solving most of those challenges to acceptable levels in the next 5-10 years.

I think driving will be a big watershed. Once you meet that kind of competence standard reliably - once people put their lives in the hands of automated judgement like this - I think you could see large percentages of jobs go very quickly. I'm not just thinking of unskilled jobs either.

For example, there's no reason a computer couldn't handle a good percentage of optometrist visits right now (with humans only required in odder scenarios). All that's stopping it is a lack of public confidence - but, again, once robots are driving I think people will come to accept them in all sorts of scenarios... and it'll spiral out very quickly.

Things are going to have to change a lot in terms of what we expect people to do all their lives, and what it means to contribute your share to the economy. Once it starts I think it's going to change very quickly.

I was kind of wondering that myself, and I'm surprised they didn't even give any even very rough performance estimates--just a lot of hand-waving and theory that doesn't apply to the device as a whole. The only engineering aspect of any real significance is in the interface to the heat source and they don't discuss that at all aside from saying "you wouldn't think it would work but it does." I

Also, it makes a really, really annoying sound. The fact that it doesn't make that sound when you shut it off, and that they went out of their way to demonstrate that for some reason, doesn't really help.

If it really is some kind of breakthrough, that would be pretty cool though. I always welcome higher frame rates for my video games.

>> ^shuac:

Very true. And while all technology products are derivative of earlier products to some degree, I think Microsoft does more bandwagon-jumping than most. Let's look at the evidence.
Java, made by Sun. "Reimagined" by Microsoft.
Console gaming, made by Atari, Nintendo, Sega, Sony, et al. Microsoft gives us Xbox.
Online Music, pioneered by Napster, made legitimate by Apple. Microsoft gives us MSN Music.
MP3 player, pioneered by Rio, made super popular by Apple. Microsoft gives us Zune.
Internet search, pioneered by Archie in 1990, made insanely profitable by Google. Microsoft gives us MSN. And Live Search. And Bing.
Far as tablet computing goes, Microsoft actually has a much bigger history than Apple. I remember MS peddling tablets back in 2001 with XP. Trouble is, XP was never designed as a touch interface. Even as recent as 2008, Microsoft tried this strategy with the Origami.
The innovation Apple made is to take its smartphone OS (whose design is based on touch) and pull it up to the tablet rather than take a full-blown desktop OS and push it down. This is the idea Microsoft is copying with Surface and Windows 8.
Other than Kinect, which is an innovative product since it is more than merely a response to the Wii, I'm not sure Microsoft invented anything. Even its flagship Office suite is based on earlier software (WordStar, WordPerfect, dBase, Lotus 1-2-3). In fact, when Microsoft first licensed MS-DOS to IBM for a huge profit back in 1981, it was essentially QDOS, which they purchased outright from some guy for $50,000. Deal of the century.
You may say, "Well Apple didn't invent the MP3 player. Why aren't they guilty of copying too?"
They are. But Microsoft's history is rife with this sort of "me-too" thing in a way no other company's is. Let me distil my point into one sentence: How many companies are copying Microsoft's products?
To sum up: Microsoft is slim on innovation, fat on looking over the shoulders of the smart kids in class...>> ^Sarzy:
>> ^mtadd:
Microsoft never fails to innovate their name on someone else's product.

Yes, because the iPad was, of course, the first tablet ever.



Cool story bro.

No, seriously though, you do raise some interesting arguments. The only point I was trying to make is that it seems a bit reductionist to dismiss the Surface as merely an iPad clone, when it seems like Microsoft is legitimately trying to do some interesting things with it and Windows 8, rather than just jumping on the iPad bandwagon.

Very true. And while all technology products are derivative of earlier products to some degree, I think Microsoft does more bandwagon-jumping than most. Let's look at the evidence.

* Java, made by Sun. "Reimagined" by Microsoft.
* Console gaming, made by Atari, Nintendo, Sega, Sony, et al. Microsoft gives us Xbox.
* Online Music, pioneered by Napster, made legitimate by Apple. Microsoft gives us MSN Music.
* MP3 player, pioneered by Rio, made super popular by Apple. Microsoft gives us Zune.
* Internet search, pioneered by Archie in 1990, made insanely profitable by Google. Microsoft gives us MSN. And Live Search. And Bing.

Far as tablet computing goes, Microsoft actually has a much bigger history than Apple. I remember MS peddling tablets back in 2001 with XP. Trouble is, XP was never designed as a touch interface. Even as recent as 2008, Microsoft tried this strategy with the Origami.

The innovation Apple made is to take its smartphone OS (whose design is based on touch) and pull it up to the tablet rather than take a full-blown desktop OS and push it down. This is the idea Microsoft is copying with Surface and Windows 8.

Other than Kinect, which is an innovative product since it is more than merely a response to the Wii, I'm not sure Microsoft invented anything. Even its flagship Office suite is based on earlier software (WordStar, WordPerfect, dBase, Lotus 1-2-3). In fact, when Microsoft first licensed MS-DOS to IBM for a huge profit back in 1981, it was essentially QDOS, which they purchased outright from some guy for $50,000. Deal of the century.

You may say, "Well Apple didn't invent the MP3 player. Why aren't they guilty of copying too?"

They are. But Microsoft's history is rife with this sort of "me-too" thing in a way no other company's is. Let me distil my point into one sentence: How many companies are copying Microsoft's products?

To sum up: Microsoft is slim on innovation, fat on looking over the shoulders of the smart kids in class...>> ^Sarzy:

>> ^mtadd:
Microsoft never fails to innovate their name on someone else's product.

Yes, because the iPad was, of course, the first tablet ever.

No worries. I'll try and check in on the playlist from time to time.
In reply to this comment by jonny:
tried to add you, but the interface appears to be broken.
In reply to this comment by geo321:
Cool! It's a great resource to have.
In reply to this comment by jonny:
sweet ... someone finally checked out my dupes playlist! I can make it a group playlist if you'd like to contribute to it.
In reply to this comment by geo321:
*dupeof=http://videosift.com/video/Chimp-Sculpting-30-secs

tried to add you, but the interface appears to be broken.
In reply to this comment by geo321:
Cool! It's a great resource to have.
In reply to this comment by jonny:
sweet ... someone finally checked out my dupes playlist! I can make it a group playlist if you'd like to contribute to it.
In reply to this comment by geo321:
*dupeof=http://videosift.com/video/Chimp-Sculpting-30-secs